contraception and the natural law: a recent study - Theological Studies

CONTRACEPTION AND THE NATURAL LAW: 

A RECENT STUDY 

Germain Grisez, associate professor of philosophy at Georgetown, married 

and father of four, has published an extraordinarily important philosophical 

study of the moral evil of contraception. 1 It is not the topics treated that 

would distinguish the study from others on the same subject. In the Introduction, 

Grisez criticizes the increasingly popular attitude among Catholics 

that appealing to experience and neglecting ethical reasoning would justify 

the practice of contraception under certain circumstances. On the other side, 

he points out the inadequacy of many arguments urged against contraception, 

both those developed along traditional lines and the recent "phenomenological" 

analyses (chap. 2). Probing more deeply, he outlines two prevalent 

but unsound general theories of moral law which underlie many of the 

arguments advanced for or against contraception. He develops a more adequate 

theory of moral law, found in the later works of Thomas Aquinas 

(chap. 3). Applying the general principles, he shows why contraception is 

intrinsically and therefore always immoral, and in the process makes clear 

what is meant here by "contraception" (chap. 4). After meeting objections 

that concern rather his general theory of morality (chap. 5), he pinpoints 

more concretely what constitutes contraception and therefore makes an act 

immoral, and under what conditions there could be, not contraception, but 

mere conception-preventing or conception-avoiding behavior, which might 

be permissible or even obligatory (chap. 6). Similarly, any contraceptive use 

of drugs is seen as intrinsically immoral (chap. 7), although for some conception-preventing 

drugs there is a legitimate use (Appendix). From the objective 

conditions of morality thus far discussed, he sharply distinguishes the 

question of subjective responsibility and morality (chap. 8). In an epilogue 

he prophesies a new age of Christian asceticism, when through God's grace, 

genuine charity, and proper training, perfect chastity will be attained and 

easily maintained both in and out of the married state. A full-page précis of 

the book, prepared by the author himself, is found in the National Catholic 

Reporter of April 21,1965, pp. 6 and 10. However, no précis will do justice to 

his complex and nuanced philosophical development nor indicate the 

breadth of his discussion of other writers on the subject, from Aquinas and 

Suárez to de Lestapis, Dupré, Janssens, Van der Marck, Ford, and Kelly. 

But the extraordinary importance of Grisez's study does not lie in the 

intelligent and thorough way he goes over well-trodden ground, nor in his 

1 Germain G. Grisez, Contraception and the Natural Law. Milwaukee: Bruce, 1964. 

Pp. xüi + 245. $4.50. 

421

422 THEOLOGICAL STUDIES 

philosophical proof of his central thesis, the intrinsic immorality of contraception, 

and his consequent practical conclusions. From this point of view, 

he will convince only the convinced. As a matter of fact, Grisez with admirable 

honesty admits that what he presents falls short of a rigorous philosophical 

demonstration. But he renders great service and raises enormous hope 

by advancing the state of the hotly controverted question out of a tenebrous 

impasse into an area where there seems finally to be possibility of light. 

First of all, the general thrust of the book meets a deficiency often noted 

in the controversy: the defending or condemning of contraception in terms 

of principles which are invoked as having universal validity, but whose 

consistent use outside the case in point seems questionable. As Grisez observes, 

those who are defending the practice of contraception in exceptional 

cases generally fail to show how the basic principles they use apply in other 

cases, e.g., in the moral judgment on homosexuality. Must not exceptions be 

permitted here too? On the other hand, the principles which are derived from 

"conventional natural-law theory," originating with Suárez, similarly offer 

difficulty when one attempts a consistent, universal application. It simply is 

not true, and no one holds it in practice, that to act and yet to prevent the 

attaining of the factual natural end of the act or of the corresponding human 

faculty is always morally evil. "The many attempts over the years to show 

the intrinsic immorality of contraception using this faulty premise have 

exposed Catholic moral thought to endless ridicule and surely have caused 

harm in other ways" (p. 31). When the prevention described above is eo ipso 

morally evil—and this is the case in acts of the reproductive faculty—it is 

not the mere natural teleology of the act or faculty that grounds the violated 

moral obligation. 

Grisez thus marks out felicitously the crucial question: What, in general, can 

ground such an obligation that a given kind of external behavior will always 

and under all circumstances be morally evil? The main opposition to any 

unconditional condemnation of contraception in terms of natural law comes 

from those who, at least implicitly, answer this more general question negatively: 

natural reason can find no such obligation. Moreover, Grisez is one 

of the first to recognize that most of the modern attitudes whence arise the 

negative answer, although they differ widely among themselves, represent 

a unified trend of thought. He calls the trend "situationism," for want of a 

better name. "Situation ethics" is but one of its modes, and the trend has 

completely infected the contemporary "post-Christian" intellectual atmosphere. 

It provides a natural temptation to Catholics dissatisfied with conventional 

natural-law theory. "Situationism" is perhaps a misleading tag, 

since the situationist, as Grisez describes him, can admit ethical principles

CONTRACEPTION AND THE NATURAL LAW 423 

generally applicable to external acts and condemning certain given acts as 

generally wrong. Moreover, the exception, which for the situationist is always 

possible to any general principle or prohibition, is justified because the 

external action in a concrete situation that is unusual, though not necessarily 

unique, objectively calls for a principle higher than the one usually applicable. 

For, according to situationism, the value of anything material lies primarily 

in its results, i.e., the consequences its realization has for the promotion 

of the truly absolute values. If, therefore, a given external action (e.g., 

violation of property) generally has bad effects for the absolute values, it is 

generally wrong. But it is always possible that in some unusual situation it 

will have consequences on the whole more conducive to the absolute values. 

In this case it will be morally right and perhaps obligatory. What characterizes 

situationism and opposes it sharply to Grisez's position is that all external 

actions (e.g., masturbation) are judged in this way. 

The absolute values, which must be sought unconditionally and without 

exceptions, are identified differently by the different ethical theories of the 

situationist trend, but they are always nonmaterial, subjective, specifically 

personal, a certain kind of conscious experience—e.g., pleasure, authenticity, 

autonomy, "charity." Procreation as such is only a bodily good and 

hence has value for the situationist, not as an absolute ideal, but at best as 

the necessary condition of absolute human values (e.g., the freedom to be 

exercised by the new person). Procreation, consequently, can be exercised 

eventually to a degree sufficient from a moral point of view, when it makes 

possible to an extent sufficient in the situation the realization of the absolute 

values. When this is done, the competition of other material goods will neutralize 

the prima-facie claim of procreation to consideration. As a result, 

any situationist will permit contraception, at least in certain cases. "And, 

of course, if a situationist's key value happens to be mutual love, then a 

neutralized procreative good which might interfere with sex for sentiment's 

sake is not worth a good second thought" (p. 59). 

The sounder, more adequate theory of moral law, which Grisez prefers to 

situationism and conventional natural-law theory, indicates a different norm 

of moral "ought," namely, the principles of practical reason. Since the least 

condition for human action is that it have some ideal, some intelligible object 

towards which it can be directed, reason first and most generally prescribes 

that good should be pursued, i.e., every good which man can attain by using 

his wits and his freedom. Since, therefore, man must be open to indefinite 

development, to the totality of human opportunity, and since man's basic 

tendencies prefigure anything man can achieve, practical reason then prescribes 

through specific principles each of the objects of these natural inclina-


tions—e.g., preservation of one's own life, mating and raising children, the 

company of other men, exploring and questioning. The primary practical 

principles turn what were experienced as mere objects of inclinations into 

ideals, intelligible motives, reasons for action, what ought to be. 

The basic principles, all affirmative, not only provide general, positive 

direction, but they ground definite obligations, positive and negative. True, 

the basic general obligation to pursue an essential human good (e.g., procreation) 

does not necessarily bind an individual at a given time or even in his 

whole lifetime to contribute toward this particular good. But it does bind 

him positively in all practical reasoning to be sensitive to this good (as to all 

essential human goods), and this sensitivity can in certain circumstances 

positively oblige him to action—e.g., when a significant realization of the 

good is in his hands alone and he has no good reason for not contributing to 

it, or when he has already engaged himself to promote this good. Negatively, 

the love reason commands for each of the essential goods binds him never 

to act directly against the realization of any one of them, even if it be for the 

sake of another essential and greater good. The negative obligation will consequently 

prohibit certain external actions as intrinsically immoral under 

all and any circumstances (what situationism fails to do and what conventional 

natural-law theory does without adequate basis). 

Grisez's Thomistic approach will represent to many, as to this reviewer, 

a welcome contribution towards the solution of the problem, but will also 

seem to raise questions that it does not answer. One can well accept from 

the start that immorality is determined and grounded only as violations of 

those goods which, each with a certain irreducible value, constitute the full 

possibilities of man's development. But how does one recognize and identify 

these goods? The specific principles of reason merely define the basic possibilities 

man has of carrying out the firstprinciple, "Good should be pursued." 

Grisez is surprisingly reticent on the meaning of reason's primary practical 

principle. Is the predicate, "should be pursued," formally a creation of reason 

(e.g., in a Kantian sense) or is it merely a proportionate response to, i.e., 

recognition of, values, the "shoulds" inherent in the possibilities such as 

those to which man's inclinations will point. Reason's most fundamental 

command, says Grisez, arises from the necessity that intelligent action have 

an intelligible goal. But what kind of necessity is this? And is there any 

reason why there should be intelligent action in the firstplace? Grisez's moral 

"ought" has the air of being ultimately hypothetical, the psychological 

requirement of man's factual drive to action and to the total fulfilment of 

his inclinations (cf., e.g., pp. 61-62, 83). This explains excellently some of 

Grisez's subsequent conclusions, but would be acceptable, one fears, to few 

ethicians in the Christian tradition.


Similarly, and more importantly for determining specific obligations, what 

is meant by "good," the subject of the fundamental principle? Grisez objects 

to situationism, according to which man should unconditionally pursue only 

the specifically, consciously personal. But he never defines or explains the 

general, identifying characteristic of all that reason, according to his Thomistic 

synthesis, prescribes to be pursued. Perhaps he means by "good" merely 

id quod appetitur. One would understand then why each basic, natural inclination 

of man has to be taken into consideration as automatically prefiguring 

a possible basic good of man. But although abnormal inclinations or 

the inclinations to want more than one's share or the instinctive appetites 

for sexual and sensual satisfaction may not be "basic" and "natural" (p. 77), 

still their objects seem good in the sense of id quod appetitur, and therefore, 

in virtue of reason's most fundamental principle, to be pursued for thenown 

sake. In other places (e.g., pp. 58, 71, 72, 77, 94) reason's most general 

principle seems to order whatever has any intrinsic value to be pursued. 

But then one would expect an explanation as to what in general makes up 

intrinsic value. Perhaps, if Grisez had given this explanation, he would not 

have determined the essential, irreducible goods for man by the sole criterion 

of his factually basic, natural tendencies, but also by the degree of immanent 

value in the object of the tendency. 

Thus, that procreation is one of the essential human goods that must be 

respected Grisez proves by the facts that having children is practically a 

universal phenomenon and that from a biological point of view the work of 

reproduction is the fullest organic realization of the living substance. Such 

reasoning illustrates well how his specific principles correspond to "basic and 

natural tendencies," but leaves intact the mystery concerning the most 

general and fundamental question: what makes anything a good at all and 

therefore to be pursued? 

However, by his own clarifying of the state of the contraception question 

and by his own tracing-out of the salient points of situationism, Grisez 

makes clear that his most decisive step lies further on. He must show how the 

absolute ideal goods a man should recognize can eventually prohibit a given 

external action under all circumstances. Obviously, such goods prohibit any 

interior act of hate or indifference in their regard, as well as any actions 

undertaken out of such motives. But how can they prohibit objectively and 

unqualifiedly an external action, when the total relation of any external 

action to an ideal good will vary with circumstances? Moreover, as he insists, 

it can be morally licit in certain circumstances to wish and prefer the nonrealization 

of the good (e.g., the cessation of the life of a friend in prolonged 

death agony). He may even arrange for the nonrealization by his omission 

or take positive action in order to allow it to take place (e.g., discontinue ex-


traordinary means by disconnecting a heart-lung machine). What is intrinsically 

evil is only to act in such a way as not to respect this good as irreducible 

ideal, i.e., to submerge or subordinate the good in the intention that 

the act by its very nature requires. In other words, that act is intrinsically 

and therefore always immoral in which the agent necessarily, by the very 

nature of the act, intends as end or means the nonrealization of the good. 

For this reason, certain types of conception-preventing behavior are always 

immoral, no matter how great the good that may result from it. 

Grisez's conclusion would follow unquestionably from any theory where 

the operative norm of obligation was the end of the faculty or act, commanded 

by a divine legislator. But he rejects such theories as inadequate. 

Can he, in his preferred framework of irreducible human goods, logically 

prohibit any given external act without qualification? Should not his sole 

norm, "a constant, positive love of each of the essential goods" (p. 87), a 

"willing that they be" (p. 91), in its practical application look only to the 

total results of the action, to what extent it works on the whole for or against 

the concrete realization of the goods? But this, Grisez recognizes, leads to 

the possibility that any given action may, at least in exceptional circumstances, 

be justified. With remarkable honesty and lucidity in his effort to 

avoid the conclusions of situationism, he depicts his moral man as one who, 

in recognizing intrinsically immoral acts, is ultimately uninfluenced by the 

results of what he does. On the other hand, apparently sensing the discrepancy 

between this position and his fundamental ethic of love of goods, he 

ascribes the ultimate irrelevance of total results to an extrinsic factor, the 

limits of human knowledge. Since man never fully knows the consequences 

of his actions, he cannot act on his evaluation of the complete outcome. God, 

of course, does fully know, and He may well have a moral judgment on a 

given action quite different from that to which human ethicians must come. 

For them, in their ignorance, the only criterion of an intrinsically immoral 

act is that by its very nature it shows disrespect of an ideal good, although 

its consequences may on the whole contribute far more to the realization of 

the good than against it. Thus, for Grisez, the love of a good (e.g., human 

life) can prohibit an action (e.g., therapeutic abortion) even in circumstances 

where the action would not increase the loss of life, but might save one (pp. 

87, 110). 

The decrees of a divine legislator discerned in natural ends could well 

justify such a practical attitude. One could leave the responsibility for results 

to the legislator. But if, as Grisez and this reviewer and many Catholics today 

believe, the legislator has simply left man to act out of his own love for the 

good, it is difficult to see how love can demand anything else of an adult but


responsibility for bringing the object loved to be, for the extent of concrete 

realization of the good—in brief, for results, estimated as best a man can. 

Incidentally, one might speculate that Grisez's extraordinary low opinion 

of man's knowledge of results may also be based on the later writings of 

Thomas Aquinas and not take sufficiently into account the revolution in 

human knowledge that began in the days of Galileo Galilei and has not yet 

come to a halt. Is it that ethicians such as Grisez are afraid to admit ultimate 

results as sole criteria of immorality because they realize that the new 

sciences may invalidate current assessments of results of a particular action 

and give a different, if truer, picture? And they, the ethicians, do not know 

what this truth might be. Perhaps it would be fairer as well as kinder to such 

ethicians to admit that any theory which invokes results as sole moral criterion 

still must explain and not suppress a basically valid experience of all 

men trying to be moral, that at times one faces certain obligations and prohibitions 

that are independent of results in one sense, in the sense of the results 

of this individual act here and now assessed by this individual man. 

Those who, like this reviewer, see the primary value of Grisez's study as, 

despite itself, pointing to some ethic of the results along the lines of "situationism," 

will recognize the challenge to such an ethic to integrate the 

above experience. 

Fordham University JOHN G. MILHAVEN, S J.

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